1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates generally to plastic molded garment hangers as are widely used for the purpose of shipping and displaying garments. More specifically, the present invention relates to a lightweight intimate apparel hanger with an improved hanger body structure, especially a hanger beam, which consumes less material and less energy for manufacture and processing the material as compared to the existing intimate apparel hangers, and which enhances structural stability and mechanical strength of the hanger against undesirable deformation and distortion of the hanger body.
2. Description of Related Art
In the area of retail garment sales, so-called Garment-On-Hanger (GOH) programs have become preferred by retailers. In a GOH program, garments are delivered to retail merchants already suspended from hangers, where upon arrival at the retail location the garments are immediately placed on display for sale. Those hangers are normally plastic molded hangers as widely used for the purpose of shipping and displaying garments.
In particular, retailers have specified particular hangers or hanger characteristics among suppliers in order to achieve uniformity on their sales floors. To this end, standards as to hanger size, shape, performance characteristics, etc., are maintained, for example, by organizations such as the Voluntary Inter-industry Commerce Standards Association (VICS). Intimate apparel hangers are one of the standardized hangers under the VICS standards, which are suitable for suspending and displaying intimate apparels, such as underwear, slips, brassieres, swimwear and so on.
With the continuing consumption of the natural resources, it is popular and necessary in the manufacturing industry to optimize the product design to save materials and energy and concomitantly reduce the manufacturing and transportation costs, without compromising performance. The resultant product under such a material and energy saving concept is recognized as an environmentally friendly product, and is much more market competitive than its prior art counterpart. In the intimate apparel hanger molding industry, millions of plastic intimate apparel hangers are manufactured each year. Thus, an environmentally friendly intimate apparel hanger would provide a significant commercial advantage to the manufacturer, transporter and retailer in the industry.
Accordingly, there is a need for a novel intimate apparel hanger that uses less material for manufacturing and still maintains its structural integrity and mechanical performance to satisfy the industry standards, for example, the VICS standards.
Accordingly, there is a need for a novel intimate apparel hanger that is lightweight and easy to handle while still maintaining the performance of the hanger.
Accordingly, there is a need for a novel intimate apparel hanger that effectively reduces manufacturing and transportation costs and uses less material to enhance the environment.
Moreover, the existing intimate garment hangers known in the prior art generally exhibit undesirable deformation of the hanger body, especially the hanger beam, under a certain load applied by the intimate apparel. For example, in the plane of the hanger body, the prior art hanger tends to bow to show an upward curve adjacent the middle of the beam, under the force applied on the opposite ends of the beam.
In addition, the hanger beam tends to flex to extend out of the plane of the hanger body, with the respective ends of the beam moving toward the middle of the hanger. Accordingly, viewing from above the hanger body, the hanger body takes a distorted C shape. In a GOH system where a large amount of garments are transported and presented together with their hangers, such distortion significantly consumes the space budget for transporting and presenting the garments. Concomitantly, the garment-presentation is not satisfactory because the garments cannot be perfectly aligned and disposed in a plane due to the distortion of the hangers.
Frequently, the hanger beam tends to twist around a horizontal or longitudinal axis of the hanger body, when, for example, the clothes hung by the hanger are intertwined with adjacent clothes.
Such deformation of the intimate apparel hangers significantly reduces the lifetime of the hangers and sometimes even breaks the hangers, which in turn causes problems in garment transportation and presentation. The above disadvantages are more prominent for intimate apparel hangers, which are normally small in dimensions.
Accordingly, there is a need in the industry for novel intimate apparel hangers, which have improved structural stability against the distortion of the hanger body, especially the deformation of the hanger beam.